Soon after the 2010 municipal election, Peter Hume stood in front of a 15-storey condo building that towered over everything else in the neighbourhood. It was a handsome, award-winning building, but it was on a block that was zoned for just four storeys.

How did it get to be 15? Well, that’s the contentious story of intensification in Ottawa. But at the time, Hume declared that this term of council would bring “certainty” to the planning process and even if not everyone was happy with the outcome, at least there wouldn’t be any 15-storey surprises.

He vowed to “strengthen” the language in the official plan, specify exactly where intensification is to take place and update the zoning to match.

Hume had to do something. The pitched battles between communities and the city’s planning department weren’t tenable. It’s no coincidence that Hume made his promise on the heels of an epic three-day planning meeting dealing with the Westboro convent redevelopment proposal. Resident after resident was outraged, accusing the planning department of spending, in the colourful words of one member of the public, “too much time drinking developer Kool-Aid.”

As a city, we’ve come a long way in four years. Combative meetings are rarer now. It even looks as if Hume will be able to deliver on his promise: at his last meeting as planning chair before he takes his leave of municipal politics, councillors are to vote to amend the zoning to conform to a “modern” official plan.

It is quite possible the city has achieved a semblance of stability on the planning front, some glaring exceptions notwithstanding. But community concern over development is still an election issue, particularly in the city’s core wards that see the most intensification. Here’s what you need to know about community-based planning in order to grill your candidate and before you cast your ballot.

Will community design plans really protect neighbourhoods?

That might be the wrong question to ask. Community design plans — or CDPs — “are in some ways misunderstood,” said Hume. “They’re not tools to keep the status quo, they’re to fire and manage growth.”

The point of them is to let the community and developers alike know where taller buildings are supposed to go and how tall they’re allowed to be. But time and time again, developers have successfully applied for rezonings well above what the CDP specified.

It’s exceptionally frustrating for communities. And you can understand Kitchissippi candidate Michelle Reimer’s declaration that the solution is “simple” — the city just shouldn’t accept applications that don’t match the CDP specifications.

But it’s not simple (and never is, when it comes to planning). For one thing, it’d be illegal not to accept an application — the city is obliged to consider all requests for rezonings. And some of those applications, including controversial ones, were passed due to vague language in the official plan that was open to interpretation as to what was allowed.

For example, developers could ask for greater height if a project “fosters the creation of a community focus where the proposal is on a corner lot or if a higher building is compatible with the existing neighbourhood.”

Naturally, everyone had a different definition of “compatible.”

Worse, if the language in the CDP and the official plan conflicted, the more generally worded official plan took precedence.

In the past, councillors would sometimes vote against plans that contravened the city’s planning policies, and then would lose costly appeals at the Ontario Municipal Board. Under Jim Watson, that hasn’t happened much — except recently when the incumbent mayor changed his mind on the council floor and voted against a controversial nine-storey student residence in Sandy Hill being recommended by the city’s own planning staff. Naturally the developer appealed the decision — the hearing just ended earlier this week.

But a few major things occurred in the last year or two that offer hope for everyone tired of the community intensification battles. The city has gotten better at developing CDPs in consultation with community members and land owners, writing documents that should be better able to withstand planning challenges. Ditto for the new OP that council passed last fall — firmer language, less nebulous intensification mumbo jumbo.

Even better, the new OP stipulates that whenever there’s a discrepancy between what that master planning document says and what the CDP says, the CDP takes precedence.

That’s a major win for communities, as long as the city sticks to its guns and doesn’t allow any zoning exceptions. And the early signs are that the city will do just that. Case in point: the proposal for the northeast corner of Island Park Drive and Wellington Street West. The developer did everything right from thoughtful community consultation to attractive design to offering to build and maintain a small park. All this in exchange for an extra three storeys the developer said were necessary to pay for worse-than-anticipated soil contamination.

But the city didn’t budge. The application was the first test of the “certainty” that Hume, backed byWatson, had promised. They passed the test.

All this to say that it’s too easy, too simplistic and not really correct when candidates simply charge that the city must start following its own guidelines.

So we’re good when it comes to CDPs then?

Well, not quite. That updated OP passed by council is still under appeal, so it isn’t in force yet.

Also, not all CDPs are created equal. Some, like the one for Richmond Road/Westboro, need more certain language. Others need an overhaul, none more urgently than the Uptown RideauCDP, which covers Rideau Street east of King Edward Avenue to the Cummings Bridge.

Dating back to 2005, the plan has a number of deficiencies. Prime among them, explains Rideau-Vanier incumbent Mathieu Fleury, is that while the plan defines that part of Rideau as a “traditional main street” — which translates into buildings up to six storeys high — the CDP makes no mention of two high-rises in the neighbourhood.

“The plan doesn’t speak to the issue of why these two buildings aren’t desirable, why they don’t fit in with the community,” says Fleury. Developers then used the existence of those towers to argue at the Ontario Municipal Board for their own taller buildings.

It’s no surprise that the Uptown Rideau CDP is a hot-button topic in Rideau-Vanier, and that contenders have similar views on the subject, including that the issue isn’t all about height.

“I think the problem is that everyone wants development along Rideau, but none of it seems to fit in at all with the character of the community,” says candidate Marc Aubin. He — like many candidates across the city — is concerned that buildings incorporate good design, provide lively streetscapes with ground-floor retail and generous sidewalks.

“We’ve been trying to get our heads around this — how to encourage not just (limited) heights, but the kind of development the community wants to see.”

Catherine Fortin Lefaivre wants “community-endorsed vision” but argued that residents “have to be willing to have a dialogue with the developer.

“Yes, it should increase the density, but not just for singles or couples, but for families too, while being economically viable for the builder and aesthetically pleasing.”

Is that all? “That’s it, easy peasy!” she laughs, in one sentence explaining why intensification is so fraught — and difficult — for communities.

What’s a Sec. 37 and why does it matter?

Sec. 37 of the Ontario Planning Act lets municipalities grant increases in height and density in exchange for money that can be used for a community benefit, whether it’s day-care space or greenspace. But the Sec. 37 benefits only kick in for projects that are proposing a 25-per-cent increase in density. There have been so few in Ottawa that planning officials didn’t feel they had enough examples to conduct a proper one-year review. The examples we did have weren’t all seen as great successes — in one case, the “community benefit” was a pathway that the developer should have built anyway.

But if we’re going to have more certainty in planning — keeping to those CDP zonings — then we’re going to have fewer Sec. 37s, says the city’s head planner John Moser. The only exception is in the Centretown CDP, where a Sec. 37-type benefit is built into the plan. In that CDP, the zoning will only be updated as an application comes forward, and the community benefit will be negotiated at that time. Hume insisted that even with this anomaly, the specifications of the Centretown CDP are just as “certain” as other CDPs. We await that test.

But aren’t all these planning decisions made behind closed doors anyway?

They aren’t supposed to be. To help increase transparency, accountability — and, frankly, trust — between the public and the planning department, the city is inviting the community in to previously closed-door meetings.

At the suggestion of a development executive, the planning department is conducting a pilot project with Capital ward incumbent David Chernushenko to bring a couple of community association representatives into the hallowed “pre-consultation” meeting, where developers ask what might or might not be allowed on a parcel of land they’re interested in. Many, including some councillors, have suspected (with some justification) that it’s at the pre-consultation meeting where planners give the nod to projects well before the official planning process begins.

Now Chernushenko is working with the planning department about how to invite community associations into these meetings to lend assurance that nothing untoward is going on and exchange ideas about the proposal.

What about those ugly infill side-by-sides being built in my traditional neighbourhood?

It took some doing, but the city did pass the first phase of its infill rules (under appeal, by the way) that says infill developments have to match the existing “streetscape character.” According to Moser, Ottawa “is leading in this field. If there’s no front-yard parking on the street, then don’t expect to have front-yard parking.” Applying to the city’s inner-city wards, the new rules — which will be embedded in actual bylaws and so should have some teeth — require builders to assess the 21 homes or lots surrounding a property to determine the dominating patterns of front yards, entranceways and parking situations. The characteristic that dominates is the one that infill projects have to match — so if most of those 21 homes have front doors, new homes can’t have side entrances. There are even rules about how much of the front yard can be taken up by a driveway.

Now comes the hard part. The second phase of the infill guidelines will deal with side and backyard setbacks, height and light blocking (by those block-type doubles that are replacing peaked roof homes). Should be fun and will put your councillor through his or her paces.

There are a lot of complaints about the OMB. Can’t we just get rid of it?

In a word, no. And don’t believe candidates who tell you they’ll do it, because the province has no intention of dissolving the quasi-judicialbody that is reviled for overturning council decisions. But the reason it overturns those decisions is usually because council voted against its own planning policies — or at least an interpretation of those policies.

That’s not to say nothing is happening in regards to the OMB. Indeed, for those interested in how the community fits into the planning process, the most exciting news may be on the provincial front.

Premier Kathleen Wynne’s “mandate letter” to the minister for municipal affairs and housing calls for, among other things, “requiring that citizen input is considered in the land use planning process and having the effect of reducing the number of applications to the Ontario Municipal Board.”The minister is also to review the “scope and effectiveness” of the OMB.

It’s early days still, but there’s reason to believe this might be more than just smooth talk. As part of their campaign platform last spring, the Liberals promised to look at changing the Planning Act to make community engagement a more formal part of the process. (It was actually Ottawa Centre MPP and Community Safety and Correctional Services Minister Yasir Naqvi who made the announcement on behalf of the party here in Ottawa.) Right now, developers are required to have just a single public meeting about a project, no matter how major. That could change, with applications possibly not being approved without evidence of more formal community engagement.

“Let’s realize the community has an important role to play,” says Naqvi, “an effective role where community has a voice from the beginning of the process.”

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